New Toy!

After refinancing our house and selling some Exilixis stock we had quite a surplus of funds this month. We talked about paying off the Jeep, paying down the mortgage, putting it all in savings, ect. We decided to put most of it in savings and spend some on ourselves! This is a big deal for us, Craig and I don't spend money on unnecessary stuff very often; especially on something this extravagant. We decided to buy a new camera (which we having been wanting for a while). But no, not just a nice point-and-shoot....we are going big! I have done quite a bit of research and we have decided on a Nikon D90 which is a very nice DSLR (digital single-lens reflex, a professional type camera).

I got a good feel for the cost and did some bidding on Ebay (A Ryan Flood suggestion, thanks Ryan!). I lost 2 but then last night we won! Like my dad suggested, we put in our maximum bid that we wanted to pay and let it ride. We got it for 10$ less then our maximum. Someone did try a last second bid, at the price we ended up paying, but our max was set higher so we won! And it is the cheapest I have seen any of the Nikon D90s go for so I feel good about it. Ebay is weird too me though, and it makes me a little nervous. Where do people get all this stuff that they are selling? I would hate to be purchasing a stolen product. I steered clear of any listings that gave me a bad feeling and I will be happy when we get the camera and the transaction is over. Here is a picture of our camera from it's ebay listing!



I am going to take a photography class, hopefully this summer and I am excited to learn to take better pictures. It is amazing the difference in quality a good camera can make. I can't believe we spent so much money on a camera, yikes! But I think it will be well worth it. Our camera sucks and our kids are growing up before our eyes. We got out Craig's Canon Rebel which is a nice SLR camera but is film. I enjoyed shooting with it today...it is so different then a point-and-shoot, so much more fun! We all but forgot about the Canon because film is so expensive to buy and develop.

Look out! I might turn into the family photographer at our family events!